1. Field of the Invention
The embodiments of the invention generally relate to estimating the leakage current of an electronic circuit and, more specifically, to a system and method for estimating the leakage current of an electronic circuit based on leakage current calculations for driven net-bounded partitions of the electronic circuit.
2. Description of the Related Art
Technology scaling causes a reduction in device channel length and gate dielectric thickness and allows for a corresponding increase in device density in modern electronic circuits (i.e., an increase in the number of devices that can be incorporated into a same size chip). Such an increase in device density and reduction in channel length and gate dielectric thickness translates into a corresponding increase in leakage current. Such an increase in leakage current in turn translates into a corresponding increase in power consumption. Consequently, the ability to estimate the leakage current of an electronic circuit and, more particularly, of an electronic circuit having a relatively high device density, has become more and more important. Unfortunately, known techniques for estimating leakage current may not be sufficiently economical or accurate. Therefore, there is a need in the art for improved techniques for estimating the leakage current of an electronic circuit.